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Declassify The Auditor General’s Report On 1MDB

I have always maintained that for any comment on 1MDB to be meaningful, it has to be made upon the Auditor General’s Report on the subject being presented to Parliament. Unfortunately that Report has been classified as State secret under the Official Secrets Act. This is untenable. The Auditor General’s Report on 1MDB must be declassified and made available to MPs and, by extension, to the general public.

2.I make this call in consonance with the decision by our Prime Minister, YAB Dato’ Seri Najib, who had decided that the Auditor General should, once and for all, get to the bottom of the 1MDB issue and submit its findings as a report for the consideration of the Dewan Rakyat. In making that decision, the Prime Minster alluded to the notion that there is nothing to hide and that those found to have done wrong would have to face the law.

3.I should like to point out that Article 107(1) of the Federal Constitution states: “The Auditor General shall submit his reports to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, who shall cause them to be laid before the House of Representatives.” Nowhere in Article 107(1), which addresses the Reports of Auditor General, is there any mention of such reports to be classified as State secrets. It would therefore be unconstitutional to prevent that report from being presented to the Dewan Rakyat.

4. It therefore stands to reason to think that the spirit underpinning Article 107(1) dictates that, in the interest of keeping the public informed of the affairs of State, transparency should be the order of the day and nothing should be hidden or concealed. This must mean that the Report should be made available to the MPs who are in Parliament representing their constituents, that is to say the members of the public. It bears reminding that the Federal Constitution, being the supreme law of the nation, must be strictly followed and upheld.

5.Given the foregoing, I implore that the cloak of secrecy surrounding the Auditor General’s Report on 1MDB be lifted, thereby allowing MPs access to it, once and for all. This will, in turn, put a stop to the anxiety and angst of the public who feel cheated and denied the right to know the real situation behind, arguably, the country’s biggest financial scandal.

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